Troubled
He was troubled in His spirit... –John 13:21
He was on the precipice of events that would change the world forever. God had put all things under His control. From this point on He was the Sovereign-in-Charge. He would run the show, but He would also experience the most excruciating suffering and death that anyone anywhere would ever endure! To say He was troubled seems to be an elegant understatement.
Yet up until this point in my studies, my (false) impression of His mindset was one of peaceful detachment, like He was gonna glide through the next day-and-a-half on some sort of emotional hoverboard. He was, after all, God, and He was committed to the plan. But John tells us that He was experiencing the same kind of “trouble” that we go through. This same word describes what paranoid, ruthless King Herod experienced when he learned from the Magi that a new king was in town. Other gospel writers use the word to connect us to the mind-melting of the disciples when they saw Jesus walking on the water and thought He was a ghost, or when He appeared to them having entered without benefit of or damage to the door after He had been raised from the dead. That kind of “troubling” that knots your gut and sends your blood pressure through the roof was something He shared with us. Because He loves us and came as one of us. In all their afflictions He, too, was afflicted...–Isaiah 63:9
What was it that was troubling Him? One of them would betray Him… one He had chosen at the Father’s wise direction, one into whom He had poured His love, attention, and instruction. In fact, the betrayer had occupied a position of trust among these twelve closest followers and Jesus had loved him so well that the others could not tell who it might be.
If it were me, I’d be troubled that trouble was coming my way and would be guarding myself against the pain. But Jesus, not nearly so self-centered as I am, was upset because of the damage and disaster that lay ahead for one He dearly loved, as well as for the pain that He saw coming for Himself! He embraced the pain, moving forward into the plan that would rescue us!
All the troubling of spirit that we experience, Jesus experienced alongside us. He did not glide through His last hours immune from anything! So great is His love for us!
No wonder I am…
Following Jesus every day in the everyday,
Christi
P.S. This is an excerpt from a book I am writing. Keep your eyes open for updates.
P.P.S. Here is a song you might enjoy about His love.
0 Comments